


This Is It

by LazyBaker



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, found out, unrequited feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 23:33:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17672240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LazyBaker/pseuds/LazyBaker
Summary: Billy Hargrove is – he’s a lot of things that remind her of who she used to be and who she still thinks she is underneath being a mom to kids who completely disregard her and a wife to an oblivious husband.





	This Is It

Karen knows she isn’t being subtle. Mike rolling his eyes tells her that. Nancy cringing and glaring absolute mortification at her tells her that. Ted, well, he’s completely oblivious and that’s the point. That’s the problem.

Being married to a man like Ted means having her needs ignored unless she turns into a nag and Karen doesn’t want to be a nag. No one _likes_ a nag and Karen Wheeler especially doesn’t like being one. She’s still the cool girl. The popular girl. The prom queen. The girl who’d stay out late at night to go on dates with the handsome older guy. The girl who ignored gossip because she was the center of gossip.

And Billy Hargrove is – he’s a lot of things that remind her of who she used to be and who she still thinks she is underneath being a mom to kids who completely disregard her and a wife to an oblivious husband.

This _thing_ wouldn’t have become a problem if she’d only ever talked to Billy the one night or stuck to just noticing, idly, the blue camaro parked around town reminding her of their little late night conversation, except Billy at her house isn’t a one time deal.

Once little Maxine joins Mike’s group, Billy is always there at Karen’s front door, nine o’clock sharp, to bring her home. Karen finds herself putting on a new layer of spray and reapplying her lipstick just minutes before she knows the doorbell will ring because Billy doesn’t ignore her or disregard her. He smiles. He flirts. He notices her.

And Karen knows he’s just a cocky kid being cocky. Half the boys in her class when she was his age were like this. Getting off on flirting with a friend’s mom. She would have rolled her eyes herself when she was seventeen. But now she’s the mom and she is so happy with the attention, even if it is from a kid Nancy’s age.

So she invites him in. Gives him sweets. Enjoys the small talk turned flirting. Blushes like she’s young again. Doesn’t bat an eye when Mike or Nancy give her a look of disdain because she is not at all subtle. 

On those nights when the camaro is leaving smoke in her driveway she doesn’t find the bed quite so cold when Ted decides to fall asleep in the armchair downstairs.

The problem gets worse when she starts looking for Billy, when she sees the camaro parked out on Main Street and thinks and rationalizes the idea of pulling over and parking and finding Billy to just say _hi_ , to talk, to have his wicked, sultry eyes directed at her again. Sees him in the pharmacy, the grocery, outside in whatever parking lot just being – she has to remind herself again and again – a teenage boy messing around with his buddies.

The other moms understand to a point – _yes_ he’s a handsome boy and _yes_ he stinks of nothing but trouble and _yes_ he is such a good big brother to that little tomboy – but _they don’t get it_ and Karen can’t tell them she’s taken to driving around town, building up her nerve to break out of the monotony of life and then breaking that nerve into pieces reminding herself the answer isn’t some kid with a camaro.

It’s nearly noon on a Saturday. She has Nancy watching Holly and keeping an eye on Mike – Ted is reading the newspaper like he always is _and if she hears him clear his throat while he turns the page one more time_ – when she spots the blue camaro outside the pharmacy.

She’s parking before she knows what she’s doing. She has her pretty pink lipstick on today, the kind she’d wear when she was seventeen, bubbly, and with an entire life of possibilities ahead of her, without one obligation to keep her back.

Then she’s out of the car, heart hammering in her chest. She doesn’t know what she’s about to do, but she knows down to her bones she needs to do something or else this emptiness inside her will never go away.

Billy isn’t in the pharmacy though. She waves _hello_ to Burton behind the counter, her entire body building with adrenaline and pressure to make a move because this is it for Karen Wheeler.

Main Street is busy and she frantically scans the street, looking for that lipstick stained denim jacket or those messy dirty blond curls. She doesn’t see anyone so she walks, knows he’s nearby, _feels it_. She’s got this one shot and god or destiny or fate or just _life_ is giving this to her and she’s got to take it. She has to. She can't take another day.

The alley between the pharmacy and the theater is a tight squeeze with a misleading angle to it making it a perfect spot for anyone who needs some privacy and Karen remembers being a girl who twirled her hair around her finger and liked to be kissed and pushed against walls by handsome boys in this alley. It’s a perfect spot. Never really gets attention unless you’re looking straight down it and Karen with her heart outside of herself is looking straight down it and she can’t make herself pull away.

The problem is, is Billy’s just a kid and Karen is hanging her hopes on a fantasy she’s built up in her head. She knows that. She does. Reality is still a hard swallow.

Billy’s got his back pressed against the wall clinging to a boy, arms wrapping around him to make wrinkles in his shirt just like Karen did when she was his age.

There must be some car blowing its horn, someone yelling something behind her, she doesn’t know but it catches Billy and the other boy’s attention and suddenly all three of them know they've been caught.

 _It’s Steve_. A shock, really. Nancy had liked him and Karen knows Steve had loved Nancy. She’d rubbed Nancy’s back so many times on so many nights after one of their dates, telling her _it’s okay_ , she wasn’t bad for not loving someone back.

They jump away from each other. Their lips are red and swollen. Steve keeps a hand on Billy’s shoulder, keeps looking at him.

Billy’s terrified.

Karen is the adult, she reminds herself. She's the grown up. The mom. The one who's supposed to be understanding and caring. She's no girl anymore. She can’t runaway or flee. She can’t cry, either. She deflates though, all thoughts of fate and life changing moments leave her with a soft sigh and all that’s left is a boneless, drifting woman.

She tells them, voice level and quiet, “come by the house sometime, Steve. DnD nights aren’t the same without you and you were always Holly’s favorite.”

And she makes to leave, slink away back to her car and her husband and the _many days of the same old same old_ she has left, but Steve calls out to her. Stops her.

“You won’t tell anyone?” Steve says. He’s holding Billy’s hand and Billy’s ducked his head, looking at the cracked cement rather than at her. Shaking and pale. A trembling scared _boy_.

“You be careful. Both of you.” Karen says. Leaves. Gets back in her car. Drives home. Sits in the driveway and fixes her makeup in the rearview mirror. Mops up her cheeks. Looks herself in the eye and tells herself _it’s okay_.

Inside, Nancy is yelling at Mike. Ted is asleep on the couch with a newspaper over his chest. Holly runs up to hug Karen’s shin and says, “I missed you.”

Karen picks her up. Kisses the top of her head, breathes in the sweet scent of her curls. Says, choked and missing something she never really had, “I missed you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> [the original tumblr post](http://granpappy-winchester.tumblr.com/post/179232497486/i-scrolled-and-saw-the-prompt-but-idk-if-you-are)
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://granpappy-winchester.tumblr.com) and [pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.io/cannibear)


End file.
